Legislative package aimed at reform of vocational education and training debated in second reading

The Standing Committee on Science, Education, Culture, Diaspora, Youth and Sport debated in the second reading the legislative package designing amendments and addenda to the law on Vocational Education and Training (VET) and to the enclosed laws.

Parliamentary hearings were also organized on that issue.

The RA Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport Zhanna Andreasyan informed that considerable changes were made after the first reading. Certain notions being used in the law were edited, their content was complied with the terminology of the international documents and professional education sphere.

The notions of the institutional programme accreditation were edited, which will give an opportunity to specify the accreditation policy. The Minister highlighted the definition of the new form of scholarship instead of various means of financing forms. As a version of qualifying the preliminary vocational education, the qualification of the junior specialist was introduced.

In the sphere of the VET the principles of the state policy and the state guarantees of the right to the person's education. They were edited, according to priorities. The fact that the VET should be aimed not at only serving the needs of the person's present, but the future.

The characteristics of the framework of the sectoral qualifications of the educational programme level, as well as the mechanisms of experimenting, evaluating and approving them were specified. Simplified licensing and recognition of the graduates' degrees was defined for the experimental programmes. Some changes were made in the demands designed by licensing of the right to the implementation of the VET educational programme. The total number of the pedagogical professionals was reduced at least to 30% instead of 50 by the main employment contract proposed by the private sector. According to Zhanna Andreasyan, it will give an opportunity to involve bigger staff from the private sector in the training process, which can have essential impact especially on practical skills.

Within the framework of the depoliticization and de-partisanship of the education sphere, the demand for political restraint during the principal's tenure was stipulated by separate provision. During the tenure, the principal of the educational institution is obliged to show political restraint, do not use the his/her official position or working means public for the interests of the parties or public, including religious unions or while campaigning attitude towards them or fulfilling his/her duties for carrying out other political or religious activity. "We complete the guarantees, which should help, defining also appropriate consequences and imposing sanctions, to prevent the system from similar behaviour," the Minister noted.

The Minister gave clarifications regarding the MPs' specifying questions.

The issue was endorsed by the Committee.